DA to lay charges against 50 people implicated in VBS Bank 'heist'

The DA will lay charges against 50 people who allegedly siphoned billions from VBS Mutual Bank on Thursday.

The report‚ titled The Great Bank Heist‚ was published on Wednesday. The forensic report‚ compiled by advocate Terry Motau and Werksmans Attorneys‚ goes into detail about how the bank heist allegedly occurred and lists a number of former executives of VBS and its largest shareholder‚ Vele Investments‚ who were the alleged perpetrators and beneficiaries of the crime.

Former president Jacob Zuma‚ the Passenger Rail Agency of SA (Prasa) and Floyd Shivambu’s brother‚ Brian‚ have been implicated in the report.

In March‚ the EFF lambasted the Treasury for putting VBS under curatorship and said the bank was being victimised because it had given Zuma a loan to pay for the non-security upgrades to his Nkandla home.

The EFF said on Wednesday that “all who are responsible and illegally benefitted from the fraud must be criminally prosecuted immediately” and “blacklisted”.

DA MP Solly Malatsi said some of those implicated have close ties to the ANC and EFF and “no doubt shamelessly abused their political connections to steal from the poor”.

“The VBS scandal has already put numerous municipalities at risk of losing revenue. Worst of all this heist has left countless poor South Africans stranded as they struggle to gain access to their life-savings.”

The DA will lay the charges at the Cape Town police station at 1pm on Thursday.

The explosive findings of a damning report into the failure of VBS Mutual Bank reveals how its architects and accomplices stole a bank. Business Day’s Warren Thompson explains what is happening at the bank.